As many professionals discover, job hunting requires a surprising array of different skill sets. You need to be everything from a highly effective project manager and researcher to a top-notch presenter when organizing your daily search efforts, sleuthing for leads and interviewing with hiring managers.
On top of that, you'll likely need to be a talented copywriter — and be able to produce engaging, high-quality written documents in the form of your resume, cover letters and LinkedIn profile. Along these lines, as somebody tasked with authoring thousands of such documents on behalf of my career coaching clients over the years, I'd offer three tips for improving your written job search materials that’ll help take them to the next level.
1. Get Creative, Dig Deep and Avoid Clichés
Years ago, I came across a LinkedIn profile where the person described themselves as “Quite possibly the only non-dynamic, non-results-oriented, non-big-picture-thinker on this entire site.” Frankly, I still chuckle when I think about it. This individual was poking fun at an issue that plagues a ton of resumes and LinkedIn profiles alike — the massive overuse of clichés.
Simply put, numerous phrases in the job search process have lost virtually all of their impact due to chronic overuse. As illustrated above, words like “dynamic” and “results-oriented” are two of the worst offenders — but I'd also encourage job hunters to steer away from terms like “big picture,” “outside-the-box,” “self-motivated,” “fast learner,” “customer-focused” and “hard-working.” It's not that these aren't important qualities or that you don't possess them. It's just that even people who don't have these characteristics list all of these exact words on their documents, watering things down to the point most recruiters don’t take them seriously anymore.
I’d also discourage people from using the term “seasoned,” which is often interpreted as “old” by recruiters and hiring managers. The same goes for mentioning “interpersonal skills,” “people skills,” or “excellent written and oral communication skills.” For professional-level roles, it's a bit weird to call these basic competencies out as if they're special, since most people already have these skills under their belt. Additionally, whenever I see the phrase "oral communication" skills, I feel like I’ve been teleported back into the 19th Century. Is it just me? It seems like such an odd, outdated thing to say in the modern era.
My advice is to eliminate the shopworn phrases above, let your creativity flow and develop more original, engaging terminology to portray your skills. Instead of saying you're results-oriented, for example, perhaps mention you have "More than 10 years of demonstrated success executing projects under challenging deadline pressure" or are "Able to translate high-level product vision into detailed tactical action plans and go-to-market roadmaps."
Alternatively, if you consider yourself a skilled communicator, prove it to employers via statements such as "Demonstrated success authoring an extensive array of digital and print content including white papers, press releases, product copy and training materials."
Last but not least, if you're wondering whether taking out the above clichés will hurt your document's chances of making it through resume scanning systems, in most cases, it won't make a difference. Recruiters (and their screening systems) typically don't search for common personality traits or the generic language mentioned above. Instead, they concentrate on hunting for the specific job-related skills and qualifications that will set one candidate apart from another in a measurable, concrete way.
2. Apply Storytelling Principles
The second critical piece of advice I'd share regarding resumes and other career-related communication is to use time-tested storytelling methods to bring your documents to life. Far too many resumes contain vague statements and ho-hum bullets that don't truly engage the reader or do justice to what an individual has accomplished. They may sound fine on the surface but won't differentiate your document from all of the other ones in the stack — and most screeners will skim right past such ambiguous language without anything sticking.
What kinds of things do garner attention and capture reader interest? Specific inclusions like financial figures, percentages, timelines and client names. These kinds of details pop off the page, uniquely characterize your background and help show, not tell, the true impact of the work you've done.
When you stop and think about it, accomplishments are pretty much the only thing that sets one candidate apart from another, given that most qualified applicants have held similar job duties and responsibilities over the years — and possess similar educational credentials. So, if you're not articulating how you've applied your skills and the noteworthy results you've generated, chances are your resume will get lost in the shuffle.
For example, many resumes I’ve encountered have bullets containing phrases such as "increased efficiency" or "improved performance" sprinkled throughout. And such claims might be perfectly true. But statements like these are so vague that the average reader will likely gloss over them.
It would be far better to retool such passages into phrasing such as "Reengineered an outdated and inefficient asset management process, developing a set of new standard operating procedures (SOP) that captured over $20K in cost savings annually" or "Led a nine-month project to replace an outdated personnel management system with a more scalable modern tool (HRNow), slashing data entry times by 20% and providing management with critical new workforce insights."
3. Use the Latest High-Tech Writing Aids (Cautiously)
The third point I'd make in terms of career-related copywriting, particularly for people who don't consider writing one of their strong suits, is to experiment with the vast array of tools that exist to give people a helping hand in their composition efforts.
The spell-checking software Grammarly can review your text in real-time as you type and notify you if you've made a grammatical mistake before offering suggestions on resolving the issue. Similarly, ChatGPT can help job seekers needing extra assistance. Ask it to write a cover letter covering certain key points — or a LinkedIn summary about a person with X, Y and Z skills — and within a few seconds, the site will crank out a suitable blurb on your behalf.
However, I offer a few words of caution. First, many job search documents (especially resumes) sometimes follow different rules of conventional grammar, so tools can sometimes lead you astray or make you paranoid about statements that are perfectly fine.
Secondly, text-generating tools like ChatGPT tend to churn out prose that's fairly bland, generic and uninspiring. So, for best results, I suggest using them as a starting point to get some ideas flowing before adding more personalized, authentic language to bring things to life.
When it comes to resumes and other forms of written career collateral, there are many tools and tricks that can take a lot of the guesswork out of the process. However, don't fall into the trap of complacency. Make sure your writing rises above the sea of generic material out there by avoiding all the common cliches — and make a point of "telling the story" and showcasing the bottom-line impact you'd had in each role!